Concerns about AOL eased at Mozilla

In the wake of America Online's
announcement that it intends to acquire Netscape Communications, a
consensus of cautious optimism about life under AOL is building among
developers working on mozilla, Netscape's open source initiative.

The announcement of
the AOL acquisition sent shockwaves through the
worldwide open source community and through the mozilla.org organization, which
shepherds Netscape's open source effort for the Communicator Web browsing
suite. Independent programmers expressed distrust of large companies and, in
particular, of AOL--which is known better for its interest in consumer
branding and profits than coding and technology.

As previously
reported, AOL pledged from time of the initial announcement to leave
mozilla.org intact.

But that did not prevent developers inside and outside
mozilla.org from imagining worst-case scenarios in which AOL pulled support
for the organization, folded the product into AOL's own graphical user
interface, or found a way around the open source license to restrict the
use of code already released.

In recent days, however, AOL has moved to reassure both Netscape and the
mozilla developers that Netscape will retain its business model and that
mozilla.org will retain its independence. Those efforts, including AOL
chief executive Steve Case's address to Netscape
employees and email to
mozilla.org, appeared to have paid off.

"People are getting the feeling that it's going to be pretty much business
as usual for mozilla.org," said Netscape programmer and mozilla.org
cofounder Jamie Zawinski. "What we've been hearing is that AOL intends to
run Netscape as separate business unit. Netscape is still going to be
developing a browser, and all the things that made Netscape decide to
embrace open source as a good business decision still hold."

Mozilla.org depends on Netscape for its infrastructure, including hardware,
bandwidth, and facilities. The company pays Zawinski and two others to
oversee the organization's day-to-day efforts. Additionally, Zawinski
estimates that about two-thirds of the developers working on the mozilla
code full-time are Netscape programmers.

In other words, if AOL were to change its mind about open source, it could
pull the rug out from under the organization--at least in the short term.

"Netscape could decide to stop paying my salary and that of the
hundred Netscape hackers working on the code," Zawinski said. "That's a
business decision they could make at any time. But the whole point of the
open source development model is that it's not dependent on any single
company."

As for the Netscape Public
License, which governs open source development, Zawinski said there was
no sunset clause or other "back door" that AOL could use to stymie the open
source activity if it wished to do so in the future.

"Everything AOL has said so far is exactly what one would want them to
say," said Paul Phillips, Webmaster of Go2Net. "Other than normal
paranoia, there's no reason not to take them at their word that they want
to have Netscape programmers, who will be AOL programmers eventually,
continue to work on the project."

An unknown part of the browser development equation is AOL's plans for the
finished product.

In announcing the planned acquisition, Case said AOL would continue to
support development of the browser, particularly as it integrates with
Netscape's Netcenter portal site,
and as AOL will integrate it into its ICQ messaging software.

"I would expect that to be a short-term decision," said Phillips, stating an
opinion shared by many analysts and observers. "If AOL spends billions on
Netscape, one would assume they're going to use the client software they
acquired."